After being embarrassed by a report on the breakdown of counterterrorism efforts before Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab boarded a Northwest flight in Amsterdam for Detroit and a series of Congressional appearances that demonstrated a lack of communication in the decision to treat the terrorist as a criminal rather than an enemy at war, the White House has begun to push back. Citing unnamed officials, the AP reports that the FBI and the CIA have begun to get information from Abdulmutallab despite having clammed up after getting Mirandized. The key, they claim, was to get his family involved in breaking his resistance:

The Nigerian man accused of trying to use a bomb hidden in his underwear to bring down a Detroit-bound airliner on Christmas Day has been cooperating with investigators since last week, discussing his contacts in Yemen and providing intelligence in multiple terrorism investigations, officials said Tuesday.

Umar Farouk Abdulmutallabs cooperation could prove to be a national security victory and a political vindication for President Barack Obama, who has been under fire from lawmakers who contend the administration botched the case by giving Abdulmutallab the right to remain silent, rather than interrogating him as a military prisoner.

In the days following the failed bombing, a pair of FBI agents flew to Nigeria and persuaded Abdulmutallabs family to help them. When the agents returned to the U.S., Abdulmutallabs family came, too, according to a senior administration official briefed on the case. The family persuaded Abdulmutallab to work with the FBI, believing he would be treated fairly in U.S. courts, the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the case.

In the days following the failed bombing, a pair of FBI agents flew to Nigeria and persuaded Abdulmutallabs family to help them.

Gee, that must have been hard work "persuading" them. The guy's father had practically been banging the door down at the US Embassy in Nigeria, trying to get the dimwits inside to listen to his warning, *before* his son boarded a commercial airliner with a bomb strapped to his crotch.

What a total waste of taxpayer money for those agents to fly over there. At most, all that was needed was to send them plane tickets, visas, and a written promise of a comfortable hotel room or apartment for their stay in the US. And given that the father is a well-off retired banker, and was very eager to help intercept his son's terrorist activities before they "got off the ground", it's quite likely that he'd have been happy to come over on his own dime.

...Since Christmas Day when fate foiled 23-year old Umar Farouk Abdul Mutallabs attempt to bring down a jetliner over Detroit one has watched in dismay as his father, Alhaji (Dr.) Umaru AbdulMutallab and the rest of his family embarked on a subtle PR ploy to cast themselves as unfortunate victims of their sons indiscretion. Some, particularly in the popular press seem to have bought into their ploy: In a side bar, The New York Times proclaimed: Parents of Suspect Offer Help. From his London base, one Eddie Iroh in comments made in Nigerias Next newspaper was quick to praise Mutallab, the father for alerting Nigerian authorities and the US Embassy in Nigeria that his son had gone AWOL.

My reading and assessment of Alhaji (Dr.) Mutallabs alert is that he simply dialed 911 to for help that could bring his son back to him. The family statement confirmed as much: We were hopeful that they would find and return him home, it reads in part. The US Embassy cared less and rightly so, to use their system to help a man who pays neither tax nor tight to sustain it to look for his son and bring him home. That US authorities simply inserted the lads name into the Terrorist Identities Datamart Environment, or TIDE, the extensive collection of data on more than 500,000 people, instead of the far smaller no-fly list, which has only 4,000 names, or the so-called selectee list of 14,000 names of people who are subjected to more thorough searches at checkpoints underscores the validity of my assessment even further. As for the Nigerian authorities, its premature at this point to even bother to infer why they wouldnt bate an eyelid in response to Mutallabs distress call. That fact will unfold clearly a little later in this piece....

COMMENTS ARE INTERESTING:

Thank you for this article. The father himself is a an Islamic fundamentalist but of different persuasions, the type you find in the northern Nigeria - the Feudo-Caliphal establishment in northern Nigeria whose only investment in the Nigerian project is a lazy and parasitic dependency on other peoples oil in the Niger Delta. Of course he was conscious of implication of his estranged terrorist son to his shady business interests and romance with the global terrorists, funding his numerous business empire - the Islamic bank which he has been trying to float for a while now and his ownership of First Bank, among others. So the only option he had was to self report the lost son (talk of sacrificial lamb!) so as to shift attention from his own crime in case the boy got caught. I hope the CIA will beyond this acting and unravel the fathers link with the world terrorist groups.

Snips: Acting CIA Director, Leon Panetta, has directed the CIA to share data collection assets, time, and classified information with about 60 select scientists. The National Reconnaissance Office, which operates the nations fleet of spy satellites, is providing much of the data.

Speaking on the involvement of Al Gore, Tom Borelli, Ph.D., director of the National Center's Free Enterprise Project, noted: "If anything, Al Gore is the real national security threat. Gore's climate change fear mongering, which lines his own pockets with cash has stoked a war against the fossil fuels so vital to our nation's economic prosperity and national security. His self-serving agenda is stymieing domestic energy exploration and production efforts. Now, he successfully lobbied to resurrect this diversion of our intelligence assets after the Bush Administration wisely ended it."

From April 8, 2009: Cyberspies have penetrated the U.S. electrical grid and left behind software programs that could be used to disrupt the system, according to current and former national-security officials.

Snip: One day the President is pointing the finger and blaming the intelligence services, saying there is a systemic failure, said one agency official. Now we are heroes. The fact is that we are doing everything humanly possible to stay on top of the security situation. The deaths of our operatives shows just how involved we are on the ground.

Did you hear Rush complaining today that they're insisting on calling this guy "the Christmas bomber," rather than the "holiday bomber" or any other secular descriptor???

Why do you suppose the Obama administration and their MSM toadies do that? Huh? WHY???

Oh, by the way, Rush was speculating why Obama keeps raggin on Las Vegas and says stuff like don't spend your "college loan money" down there. He wondered if it was because the Koran speaks against gambling... he kept sayin... "I'm just sayin..."

25
posted on 02/03/2010 6:56:08 PM PST
by SierraWasp
(NO MORE BOLSHEVIK PLOTTERS IN THE WHITEHOUSE!!! NO MORE IN OUR GOVERNMENT!!!)

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